Mod'ing The CS Trail Hawk

modded hawk

IMG_0651.jpg
 
SWEET.

i humbly suggest that you spray paint the paracord with some opposing tan pattern splotchies.

watch that thing disappear before your eyes then, brother '5.

SLURP.


well-friggin'-DONE, sez i.

:thumbup:

....this is obviously a canadian trick....

:cool:

vec
 
hopefully, these might inspire you to go for it, fellow-babies.


get a Cold Steel Trail Hawk, shave the cheeks, dremel a beard in the bit, and lop the poll - it's a whole new animal.
webMARPAT1.JPG


tape + paint = yogetthepicture!
webARPAT1.JPG


well? - get painting, brethren...!

move, move, move.

:cool:

vec
 
Very nice work, vec.

I'm curious about the effect of cutting the poll on the Trail Hawk or the Rifleman.

Is just the face of the poll hardened, or the whole thing back to the eye? If I lop the end am I going to lose the hardened steel?
Of course it may not matter, this 1055 strikes me as tough steel that can take some pounding even if not heat-treated.
 
tychoseven said:
....

I'm curious about the effect of cutting the poll on the Trail Hawk or the Rifleman.

Is just the face of the poll hardened, or the whole thing back to the eye? If I lop the end am I going to lose the hardened steel?
Of course it may not matter, this 1055 strikes me as tough steel that can take some pounding even if not heat-treated.
Click to expand...


HARDNESS/TEMPER:

i think you are insightful, per your 1055 statement, brother tycho:


a couple items that we may want to observe first:

the literature says that the 1055 steel on the Cold Steel tomahawk line is zone-hardened, hence the concern of lopping stuff off...:thumbup:....

1055 steel quenches at about 65 Rockwell C, if i remember correctly.

this alloy also might be low enough on the scale for "skin hardening" which was very useful in early high-recoil revolovers (again, this is not gospel, it's just the poor recollective abilities of your pal, ol' vec, confused but alive as he is).


my wind-blown conclusion so far, from my experiences:

the zone tempering is such, that at the thin areas (like the neck of the poll on a Rifleman's hawk, and/or to lessor effect on the less-exaggerated design of the Trail Hawk) the zone heat treat might be hardening into that neck, thereby making a nice effective lopped-poll (my consistent experience) - if this is true, the value of a zone heat treat, or even the presence of it might be in doubt - and i believe it is.

as brother tycho suggested, i too suspect that the durability on these hawks is from the forgiving nature of the 1055 steel, not from any special heat treatment, real or imagined.

from the cupping i have seen on some Cold Steel bits (which does not effect their chopping abilities IMHO - cupping might actually improve it! - i can hear the purists cringing now!), i reckon they are cycling the hawks up to critical, and then haphazardly dropping them into a quench, with no concern over the hawk heads' orientation, to how they enter the quench.

this might be true, and even if it isn't, on a large scale, i think it might be a perfectly sound practice, in the case of 1055.


on the other hand...;

....if these hawks ARE indeed zone tempered (and done so perfectly, for discussion purposes), and you are exposing soft metal when you lop the poll, then you could simply skin harden the poll back to something past Rockwell C 60 by putting a hot bit of metal at critical temp up to it until you note a blondish color change.

(....taking a moment to virtually breathe here....)

:D


my cut-off polls all seem to be hard enough as is so far.

and i never let them get hot, or even warm, during re-shaping.

YMMV, and if it does, i think you are still in luck.


............

NEW HANDLING CHARACTERISTICS OF A LOPPED-POLL HAWK:

the following observation is limited to just Cold Steel Rifleman's Hawks and Trail Hawks, brethren...;

the Rifleman's Hawk is a great thing, but to me, it is not a hawk - but rather an axe with hawk-like features.

it is massive.

when you lop the poll off the Rifleman right at the neck of the poll, it becomes quite a different animal, and i love it instantly - much more agile.

the neck can be backed up a little (nominally 1/16" to 1/8") with a grinder, to make it larger, but i like it right at the poll/head junction - it is better than a spike, and it is better than a poll, for my outdoor enjoyment - a true hybrid, just like a hawk itself! - not a specialized weapon, nor a specialized tool.

the Rifleman stays steady in a swing, in this new evolution, moving fore and aft.

this cannot be said as much for the Trail Hawk, as seen in my MARPAT example.

on the MARPAT the hammer direction is the optimum direction for tracking now, where it was neutral before, in both ways. - this should not be considered a detriment, especially in modern fighting systems, and the humble lopped Trail Hawk still serves as a great tool, by my regard.

but the hawk's speed and recovery rates have screamed into space now.

the mod'd hawk is still very steady now in the bit-strike direction, just not as much as before, with the poll to stabilize its trajectory.


i like the Trail Hawk both ways, with a poll, and without.

it, in my mind, is the near-perfect production hawk, regarding cost and design.

and some fellow-babies here do diggit.

:cool:

HTH.

vec
 
Vec,

You gotta stop doing this, brother! Every time I see some of the fine work you do, it makes me want to spend more money on Trail Hawks....

Well, I guess I could spend less money on food.
I don't have to eat every night of the week :D

As always, very nice work.
 
Skean Dhu said:
Vec,

You gotta stop doing this, brother! Every time I see some of the fine work you do, it makes me want to spend more money on Trail Hawks....

Well, I guess I could spend less money on food.
I don't have to eat every night of the week :D

As always, very nice work.
Click to expand...

hey now!

i am hardly showing you guys anything - just the stuff that you can do too.


just start hunting for food with the new hawks, brother.

problem solved.

:thumbup:

vec
 
Howdy gents-

My Trail hawk finally arrived today despite some shipping issues, and I'm really quite pleased with it. It's not much to speak of 'out of the box', but it's easy to see where it can best be improved cosmetically. It feels very functional and I think it'll make a good chopper and woods companion actually. I'm pleasantly surprised by the heft it has overall, I expected it to be much lighter.

I've found a simple way to mod the head that I'm really liking, but I'll wait to show pictures until I get it all taken care of.

I've thus far only thinned out the blade a bit, changed the finish, and sanded the wood down. There was some head play when I first got it, but it's much better fitting now. Hopefully by next week I can get the handle completely refinished and add a few other 'tricks'. I think it'll look really cool when it's said and done! :thumbup:

Oh, are you folks keeping the little set screw when you get it finished, or do you just ditch it and rely on the handle fit?
 
SpookyPistolero said:
Howdy gents-

My Trail hawk finally arrived today despite some shipping issues, and I'm really quite pleased with it. It's not much to speak of 'out of the box', but it's easy to see where it can best be improved cosmetically. It feels very functional and I think it'll make a good chopper and woods companion actually. I'm pleasantly surprised by the heft it has overall, I expected it to be much lighter.

I've found a simple way to mod the head that I'm really liking, but I'll wait to show pictures until I get it all taken care of.

I've thus far only thinned out the blade a bit, changed the finish, and sanded the wood down. There was some head play when I first got it, but it's much better fitting now. Hopefully by next week I can get the handle completely refinished and add a few other 'tricks'. I think it'll look really cool when it's said and done! :thumbup:

Oh, are you folks keeping the little set screw when you get it finished, or do you just ditch it and rely on the handle fit?
Click to expand...


The screw!!! It does nothing!!!

goggles.jpg


Seriously though, its no help at all if you install the head wrong, and even less help if you do it right.
 
hey everyone! just have to say that i began reading this thread and not even half-way through...i ordered my trail hawk, hah. Up until now, i was a huge knife thrower. I've made my own for a couple years now and i just need something a little more...lets say...fullfilling. I'm highly impressed with everyone's designs. Vec's composites, Q's parkerizing, and i wont keep naming. I like ALL of them.


Looks like ill be modding as of tuesday. Cant wait to shows some ideas of my own and possibly take in a bit more advice.

nick
 
NO F-Bdy Bs said:
The screw!!! It does nothing!!!

goggles.jpg


Seriously though, its no help at all if you install the head wrong, and even less help if you do it right.
Click to expand...

Haha, I've always loved that scene. My GF has to here that phrase constantly!

That was what I was figuring about the screw, seems like a solution to a non-existent problem if the haft is in right.

:thumbup:
 
SpookyPistolero said:
Howdy gents-

My Trail hawk finally arrived today despite some shipping issues, and I'm really quite pleased with it. It's not much to speak of 'out of the box', but it's easy to see where it can best be improved cosmetically. It feels very functional and I think it'll make a good chopper and woods companion actually. I'm pleasantly surprised by the heft it has overall, I expected it to be much lighter.

I've found a simple way to mod the head that I'm really liking, but I'll wait to show pictures until I get it all taken care of.

I've thus far only thinned out the blade a bit, changed the finish, and sanded the wood down. There was some head play when I first got it, but it's much better fitting now. Hopefully by next week I can get the handle completely refinished and add a few other 'tricks'. I think it'll look really cool when it's said and done! :thumbup:

Oh, are you folks keeping the little set screw when you get it finished, or do you just ditch it and rely on the handle fit?
Click to expand...

I remove the allen screw and after a few dozen throws to set the head on the shaft, i squirt in some West Systems epoxy and put the allen screw back in and snug er up. I then take a bit of beeswax and fill the allen head flush to the top.
 
Hey guys, just wanted to say thanks for the info on moding the hawks. I ran across this thread while looking for pictures of sheaths for hawks. I haven't found what I'm looking for yet so I guess I will just have to make my own. I have a TH that I have tried to make look as historically authentic as I know how. I would post some pics but I can't seem to figure out how. Anyway it looks like I'm going to have to buy a couple of more hawks and try my hand at "mod"ernizing them,LOL.

Sorry, I didn't know you could just post images if you weren't a paying member and as I'm not a member at a image hosting site, I guess no pics.
 
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